The ease with which federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty dismissed the proposed one per cent HST increase needed to fund transit in the GTA is an indictment both of the man and his party, Christopher Hume writes

The ease with which federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty dismissed the proposed one per cent HST increase needed to fund transit in the GTA is an indictment both of the man and his party.

Not only does Flaherty’s knee-jerk intransigence hurt constituents in his Whitby riding, it flies in the face of his much-ballyhooed support for progressive, pro-transit urban projects such as waterfront revitalization and Evergreen Brick Works.

If the minister believes what he says about the latter, how can he argue the former? If Waterfront Toronto, the agency overseeing the renewal process, and Evergreen, the private foundation creating an environmental hub in the Don Valley, are doing such good work, why would Flaherty not heed their message. Indeed, one of the fundamental principles of waterfront redevelopment is that new neighbourhoods, which will eventually be home to 100,000 people, will be organized around public transit. No resident will be more than a five-minute walk from a stop.

Instead, transit has become an entirely political matter. Flaherty’s refusal reflects more on his relationship to Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and the provincial Conservatives than the well-documented need for enhanced transit throughout the Greater Toronto Area.

Both Ford and Tory Leader Tim Hudak have rejected an HST increase, and all the other revenue-generating options proposed by the provincial transit agency, Metrolinx, as well as historically reliable conservative allies such as the Toronto Region Board of Trade.

There’s nothing unusual about Flaherty’s willingness to put personal and political expediency ahead of public need — we expect as much from the elected — but his unconcern about being revealed a hypocrite gives one pause. Clearly, though, it doesn’t bother him. He has no fear of being held accountable.

For millions of us, however, transit is one of those grinding issues that must be dealt with daily. It’s as basic as getting to work and back.

But in post-amalgamation Toronto, where a culture of urban/suburban polarization now prevails, even bed-rock essentials like transit take a backseat to the most primitive political partisanship. The priority is to punish the opposition, not improve our quality of life. To that end, transit has been recast as a downtown plot to squeeze cash from the unsuspecting hinterland.

In fact, no communities would benefit more from decent transit than those represented by Flaherty and Ford. Ironically, it is the bringing of transit to these low-density conurbations that has led to growing public subsidies of the network. Though largely forgotten, the pre-suburban TTC paid its own way and even managed the odd surplus.

In 1946, for instance, servicing a city of about 600,000, the commission provided an impressive 310 million rides. As former Toronto mayor John Sewell points out in his book, The Shape of the Suburbs, “(When) the ground breaking for the Yonge Street subway occurred in September 1949 . . . half of the funding came from the surplus that the TTC had generated during the war; the remainder came from debentures issued by the TTC.”

A few years later, in 1953, regional government made its debut in the form of the Metro Toronto government. It handled needs that crossed borders, including transportation. That allowed municipalities to deal with local matters and gave them input into the larger issues.

Though Metro was generally acknowledged a success, the province killed it in 1998 when then Ontario premier Mike Harris forcibly amalgamated Toronto and its surrounding jurisdictions. That gave rise to the suburban-dominated city that created Rob Ford, one in which transit no longer counts as an urgent political priority.

And so it goes.

Flaherty, however, knows better. He, more than most of his critics, certainly his allies, understands that his response to the HST was unacceptable.

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